thank you @GroovyGeek...I need to read up on sequencing vs genotyping, at the moment I don't understand the difference...I thought 23andme will tell me what is my most important sub-set of genes and then I will know how quickly might get Alzheimer for example (what I am going to do with that information that is another story, buy a gun to kill myself when the time comes? or that will be too late as I will forget how to use it)

I agree that some form of DNA analysis with a help from smartphone could be used by medical personel in case of outbreaks as in your example...I don't see people using it personally, I think that will create a chaos of unbelievable proportions

Can't sequence for a few hundred $ - 23andme is not sequencing, it is genotyping, slightly more sophisticated than the other popular perception of what DNA sequencing is (CSI Miami style), but still a far cry from whole genome sequencing (or even whole exome). Why you way want a highly portable sequencer? There is a lot more to sequence than humans themselves which affects humans. Look up "microbiome" for example. When your hospital has an infection outbreak knowing what bug is causing it "here and now" can be invaluable rather than sending out a sample to a lab and waiting a few days to get an answer. Tracing down the source of an infectious disease with near certainty in near real time can also be valuable (this was used on the Haitian cholera a few years ago to determine the viral strain and its origination point). The article left the impression that everyone would carry a cell phone that can do sequencing. I don't think this was the intent, but we can let the author clarify for himself.

I am equally puzzled...why would I want to sequence my DNA using my smart phone?...if I really want to do it I can take a sample and send it to one of these companies that can do it for few hundreds dollars...presumably my DNA doesn't change on a daily basis ;-)

Can we not have the genomic sequence of a person stored in a central data base and linked with that person's socila security number?

In that case the geneomic sequnces of the whole worlds population could be in a central repository which can be accessed by any doctor anywahere in the world and will help diagnose a health problem the person may be facing.

Why such a crucial information in a handset which are vulnerabel for damage, loss, theft ?

Healthy skepticism but for the wrong reasons. Sequencing is not just for chronic diseases http://www.genomeweb.com/clinical-genomics/next-generation-sequencing-pipeline-finds-cause-critically-ill-boys-disease

When most medical visits are due to chronic disease management, what new genetic information does the body create along different "phases" of a chronic disease(unless it's cancer) ? How can genomics be the solution here ?